About Restaurant Openings Around DC
A guide to the newest places to eat and drink.
It’s a blockbuster day for restaurant openings across the DC area. Here’s a look at all the debuts—from a Sicilian restaurant with $7 martinis to a fine-dining destination with a $255 tasting menu.
Alfreda
2016 P St., NW
Chef Russell Smith spent much of his career in fine-dining restaurants such as BlackSalt in the Palisades and the Source in Penn Quarter. Now, he’s striking out on his own with this unpretentious New York-style pizza parlor in Dupont Circle. Alfreda, named after his grandmother, takes a minimalist approach to toppings on its brick oven sourdough pies (gluten-free crust is also available) with add-ons like anchovies, house sausage, and pickled chilies. You’ll also find a handful of salads and simple small plates such as slow-cooked garbanzos or mushroom conserva with whipped herb ricotta.
Cucina Morini
901 4th St. NW
Caruso’s Grocery chef Matt Adler partners with the group behind his alma mater, Osteria Morini, for a new restaurant in Mount Vernon Triangle focused on Sicilian and southern Italian cuisine. The menu features several crudos (sample three for $22), vegetable small plates, and handmade pastas, such as squid-ink taglioni with shellfish ragu or paccheri alla Norma with eggplant and basil. Also don’t miss $7 martinis all night long in the lounge. The deal includes nitro espresso martinis, classic dirty martinis, and “Morini martinis” spiked with caper brine.
Reverie
3201 Cherry Hill Lane, NW
Chef Johnny Spero finally reopens his Georgetown fine-dining destination after a fire devastated it in 2022. The Michelin-starred restaurant has a brand new tasting menu—$255 per person—that centers around vegetables and East Coast seafood. The 12-to-16 courses include modernist dishes like savory potato-onion doughnuts filled with glazed eel, and strawberry/gochujang milk sorbet with frosted herbs. (A vegetarian menu is also available.) The 36-seat dining room has a moodier new look with a black granite open kitchen counter and shou sugi ban wood—using the Japanese technique of preserving wood with fire.
Upside on Moore
1700 N. Moore St., Arlington
Another food hall? Another food hall! This one, occupying 30,000 square feet in Rosslyn from the group behind Thompson Italian and City-State Brewing Company, covers everything from dumplings to Filipino nachos to smash burgers. You’re likely to recognize some familiar names, including Ghostburger, Stellina Pizzeria, Laoban Dumplings, Lucky Danger, and more. Lightning Coffee Co. supplies daytime brews (there’s free wi-fi and plenty of outlets for remote workers), while Elli Benchimol of Georgetown’s Champagne-and-caviar spot Apéro is curating the bar menu.
Jessica Sidman covers the people and trends behind D.C.’s food and drink scene. Before joining Washingtonian in July 2016, she was Food Editor and Young & Hungry columnist at Washington City Paper. She is a Colorado native and University of Pennsylvania grad.
